Simple premise what is the key or main strength in each of the canon Fallout games?

I'm interested to see what the perceived strengths of the series and of each individual games are.

Is it possible to amend the poll so not casting a vote is an option? I've not played Fallout 1 or 2.

Poll has been rectified

Thank you! I went for atmosphere not exploration for Fallout 3, due to the desolate wasteland feel where danger lurked behind every corner (first time around, even exploring Springvale had me on edge) and the creepy claustrophobic metro tunnels. Fallout New Vegas I picked writing, mainly for the amount of moments where I had to pause the game and try and figure out what was the best choice for these characters.

Atmosphere in F1. The most coherent and "raw" game in the series for me, it just hits the spot. The one in the series that I was most immersed into.

Quest design for NV and Fallout 2. Many ways of finishing quests, it's also great when some of your choices may block some content. Talking with Lynette is one of the best examples of that and one of my favourite gaming moments.

I voted moral ambiguity for F3 because deal with it.

Any of the Fallout games doesn't have great combat IMO. Even older parts. Definetely not the level of Knights of the Chalice or even Temple of Elemental Evil (and I don't even like the latter all that much).

What else does? It's best in class.

Not playing 1 or 2 for long, I could not vote for those.

Fallout 3 I liked the exploration of the DC Wasteland. As David pointed out, the whole atmosphere felt "Post Apocalyptic" to me.

Fallout: New Vegas I voted for quest design, though the writing was good, too, though I also enjoyed Fallout 3's writing. New Vegas just did not feel "Post Apocalyptic" to me. It was a desert beforehand and was still a desert afterwards. Not a lot of ruins or devastation were to be found.

Kind of difficult. Good quest design involves good writing. Even atmosphere can be attributed in some regards with dialogue, which would fall into writing.

I voted atmosphere for FO1 but it is really a 3 way tie with writing and quest design. Same with FO2 but I gave that and NV a writing vote.

I have never finished this game. Despite combat mechanics being superb, AI is rather weak and level design leaves much to be desired. That's why I wrote that I prefer KotC. Mechanics are very, very similar (also D&D, only downsides compared to ToEE being no skills and only three classes), but AI and encounter design are amazing, even though entire game is made by basically one guy.

This poll was interesting because I couldn't really pick a strong zone for Fallout 2. The others were fairly obvious for me but FO2 didn't really stick out in any of those specific categories now that I think back to it. The only Fallout games with great stories were the original and New Vegas honestly. Combat in the original games was always boring but I still played for the Fallout experience. Really great poll!

Iv played the first too but didn't get far so had to work on what I'd got too.
FO3 and NV iv played a lot So I'm better with them I loved the quests in NV but found FO3 a bit linior tho it still rates in my top 10 games

Some of the Fallout games excel at a lot of these factors. Hard to choose but this is how I see it:

Fallout: Atmosphere. It was the game that established the very atmosphere that we all know and love in a Fallout game. Despite how much the original Fallout excels at, I'd say it gets the atmosphere vote most for what it started.

Fallout 2: I find that FO2 touched on almost all of these factors with the amount of content it had, but didn't necessarily do the best in any of them. Which doesn't mean they did poorly in them though, just that other Fallout games did better in those areas. But, I'll say quest design for Fallout 2.

Fallout 3: MUH ATMOSPHERE. No, just kidding. I'll give it exploration because Todd Howard said so.

Fallout New Vegas: Writing. Hands down, some of the best writing I've seen in the Fallout universe. Especially in some of its DLCs, like Dead Money.

Hard to vote because I've always viewed Fallout (1 & 2) as a sum of their parts and not really as something where one or another aspect clearly excels over the others and defines the bulk of the experience.

Fallout 3 clearly has the visual world design and New Vegas has the quest design and writing doing the defining.

I voted pretty much Atmosphere across the board, but I had to vote Writing for New Vegas. In all honesty that might not be completely accurate as it was the DLC's that really brought the writing up, not the main quest imho. Dead money and the Divide were excellent.